Steve & Barry's a hot name for shopping mall managers

That assessment comes from the International Council of Shopping Centers, which last month released a survey in which 3,000 North American managers were asked to identify the retailers who were most driving shoppers into the malls. Rounding out the top five were White House Black Market, a clothing format of Chico's FAS Inc., and housewares retailer Williams Sonoma Inc.

With its $10-or-less concept, Steve & Barry's sells men's, women's and children's clothing, including jeans, jackets and officially licensed college goods, in stores ranging from about 20,000 to 150,000 square feet, typically in second-tier malls.

The privately held retailer, based in Port Washington, N.Y., has 72 U.S. stores. In June 2004 it opened one in Westfield Chicago Ridge mall in Chicago Ridge, followed in October 2004 by a location in North Riverside Park Mall in North Riverside. It plans to open an additional 50 stores by year-end, including four more in the Chicago area.

"If I'm the Limited or Gap, I've got to be really scared if they get bigger," Thomas Rubel, chief executive of consulting firm Retail Forward Inc., said at a May 12 conference in Chicago. Likewise, at the National Retail Federation convention in January, McMillan Doolittle consultant Neil Stern also cited Steve & Barry's as a retailer to watch.

Steve & Barry's has signed a lease for a 26,000-square-foot store at Westfield Fox Valley in Aurora and for a 65,000-square-foot store at Randhurst Mall in Mt. Prospect. The stores are expected to open this fall.

Leases also are being negotiated for stores at Westfield Louis Joliet in Joliet and University Mall in Carbondale.

In a May interview, Steve & Barry's co-founder and co-Chief Executive Barry Prevor said he's interested in any mall anchor spots that might open up as a result of industry consolidation. Mall developers, he noted, have become more open-minded about what constitutes an anchor tenant in light of mergers and acquisitions making department stores more homogeneous.

"If a mall has four department store anchor spots, and one goes vacant, then years ago mall management would have thought, `Get another department store.' Now, they say, `We have three department stores selling the same brands at the same prices. What would be the point of bringing in an identical department store?'" Prevor said.

"So they look for alternative uses. This has been one of the great drivers behind our growth."

Is Steve & Barry's in talks to buy any stores from Sears Holdings Corp. or Marshall Field's?

"Yes, we are," Prevor said. But "I really can't talk about that right now."

Short shrift? As Sears expands away from its traditional milieu of malls, at least one Wall Street analyst wonders if the Hoffman Estates-based retailer is investing enough money in the off-mall Kmart locations that it's converting to its new Sears Essentials format.

"Sears Essentials stores will get only $3 million of investment to switch from Kmart to the new format," Morgan Stanley analyst Gregory Melich wrote in a June 17 report. "By comparison, Wal-Mart and Target typically spend $4.5 million to $6 million every five to seven years to keep their regular discount stores in good stead."